Feedback loop content recommendation

ABSTRACT

Media content may be recommended based on feedback weightings. Input data describing the presentation of a media content items in association with content management accounts may be represented as data points. Each data point may identify feedback data for a media content item previously recommended for presentation in association with a content management account. The feedback data may identify a viewer reaction to the recommended media content item. A weighting factor based on the feedback data for the media content item presented in association with the content management account may be applied to produce a recommendation.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of and claims priority to U.S. patentapplication Ser. No. 13/661,294 (Atty Docket No. MOBIP111), filed onOct. 26, 2012, by Chad Kalmes, Mark Jacobson, and Tim Lynch, which ishereby incorporated by reference in its entirety and for all purposes.

TECHNICAL FIELD

The present disclosure relates to the recommendation of media contentitems.

DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART

Content recommendation engines may be used to predict media contentitems that a user may be likely to enjoy. Many content recommendationengines rely upon mathematical algorithms to compute predictive modelsfor content recommendation. The predictive models facilitate theselection of available but unviewed content items for recommendation tothe user. Such selections are often based at least in part on the user'sprior viewing habits. In many cases, however, developing an accuraterecommendation for specific content may be difficult, such as when auser has viewed a relatively small amount of content or when the user'sviewing history does not sufficiently match other users' viewinghistory.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The disclosure may best be understood by reference to the followingdescription taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, whichillustrate particular embodiments.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a method for recommending mediacontent, performed in accordance with various techniques and mechanismsof the present invention.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a system that can be used with varioustechniques and mechanisms of the present invention.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a media content preference data andrecommendation chart.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a method for pre-processing mediacontent recommendation data.

FIGS. 5A-5C illustrate examples of charts depicting pre-treated data.

FIG. 6 illustrates an example of a method for providing feedback-basedweighting content recommendations.

FIGS. 7-9 illustrate examples of systems.

DESCRIPTION OF EXAMPLE EMBODIMENTS

Reference will now be made in detail to some specific examples of theinvention including the best modes contemplated by the inventors forcarrying out the invention. Examples of these specific embodiments areillustrated in the accompanying drawings. While the invention isdescribed in conjunction with these specific embodiments, it will beunderstood that it is not intended to limit the invention to thedescribed embodiments. On the contrary, it is intended to coveralternatives, modifications, and equivalents as may be included withinthe spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.

For example, the techniques of the present invention will be describedin the context of fragments, particular servers and encoding mechanisms.However, it should be noted that the techniques of the present inventionapply to a wide variety of different fragments, segments, servers andencoding mechanisms. In the following description, numerous specificdetails are set forth in order to provide a thorough understanding ofthe present invention. Particular example embodiments of the presentinvention may be implemented without some or all of these specificdetails. In other instances, well known process operations have not beendescribed in detail in order not to unnecessarily obscure the presentinvention.

Various techniques and mechanisms of the present invention willsometimes be described in singular form for clarity. However, it shouldbe noted that some embodiments include multiple iterations of atechnique or multiple instantiations of a mechanism unless notedotherwise. For example, a system uses a processor in a variety ofcontexts. However, it will be appreciated that a system can use multipleprocessors while remaining within the scope of the present inventionunless otherwise noted. Furthermore, the techniques and mechanisms ofthe present invention will sometimes describe a connection between twoentities. It should be noted that a connection between two entities doesnot necessarily mean a direct, unimpeded connection, as a variety ofother entities may reside between the two entities. For example, aprocessor may be connected to memory, but it will be appreciated that avariety of bridges and controllers may reside between the processor andmemory. Consequently, a connection does not necessarily mean a direct,unimpeded connection unless otherwise noted.

Overview

Techniques and mechanisms described herein facilitate the recommendationof media content items. Many content recommendation engines rely uponmathematical algorithms to compute predictive models for contentrecommendation. The predictive models facilitate the selection ofavailable but unviewed content items for recommendation to the user.Such selections are often based at least in part on the user's priorviewing habits. These viewing habits may at least in part reflect theperformance of previously-made recommendations. According to variousembodiments, the relative weight assigned to a user's media contentpreferences or viewing history may be affected by whether a viewedcontent item was recommended to the user by the recommendation system.For instance, a content item that was recommended to the user and thatthe user selected for viewing may be weighted more highly in order toreinforce the recommendation techniques that gave rise to the successfulrecommendation.

Example Embodiments

According to various embodiments, users may receive content from acontent management service. The content management service mayfacilitate the interaction of users with various types of contentservices. For instance, the content management service may provide auser interface for managing and accessing content from a number ofdifferent content sources. The interface may display content receivedvia a cable or satellite television connection, one or moreon-demand-video service providers such as Netflix or Amazon, and contentaccessible on local or network storage locations. In addition, theinterface may be used to access this content on any number of contentplayback devices, such as televisions, laptop computers, tabletcomputers, personal computers, and mobile phones.

According to various embodiments, a media content recommendation enginemay include one or more algorithms or formulas for recommending content.The media content recommendation engine may, for example, compute matrixfactorizations and permutations based on information such as preferenceand viewing history information associated with a user account. Thesecomputations may be used to match users with media content that theyhave not yet watched.

According to various embodiments, various types of information may beused as inputs to create media content recommendations for users. Insome cases, a user may expressly indicate preferences regarding mediacontent, such as by rating a media content item or indicating that amedia content item is liked or disliked. In other cases, a user mayimplicitly indicate preferences regarding media content. For example, auser may exhibit a pattern of watching westerns, dramas, or programsthat involve particular cast members or directors. As another example, auser may tend to request to view detailed information regardingparticular types of content.

According to various embodiments, some or all of the various types ofinput information may be weighted based on various criteria. Weightingthe input information may in some cases improve the validity andrelevance of the data sets returned from increasingly large and complexseries of usage statistics. Additionally, or alternately, weighting theinput information may provide increasing quality of experience andbetter targeting of returned results from the searched data. Inparticular embodiments, the types of weights that may be applied to theinput information may be strategically determined based on factors suchas the observed behaviors of the users interacting with the system.

According to various embodiments, a weighting factor may be used totreat a data point different during numerical modeling. For example, apositive weighting factor may render a data point more significantduring modeling, while a negative weighting factor may render a datapoint less significant. As another example, a weighting factor greaterthan one may render a data point more significant during modeling, whilea weighting factor between zero and one may render a data point lesssignificant. The precise effect of weighting factors may bestrategically determined based on factors such as the type of numericalmodeling being performed.

According to various embodiments, some or all of the various types ofinput information may be weighted based on whether recommendationspreviously made by the recommendation system were acted upon by users.For instance, the same content item may be recommended to a variety ofusers who have similar content viewing histories and preferences. Ifmany of these users viewed this recommended content item, then thecontent item may be weighted more heavily in subsequent iterations ofthe recommendation procedure. However, if users did not tend to selectthe recommended content item for viewing, then the content item may beweighted less heavily in subsequent iterations of the recommendationprocedure. By assigning higher or lower weighting to the pieces, types,categories, channels, and/or genres of recommended content thatconstituted successful or unsuccessful recommendations, the baselinemathematical algorithms that calculate the returned recommendationresults may yield a higher percentage of more accurate and more relevantcontent for the viewer.

According to various embodiments, the model may be implemented in termsof percentage weighting, integer weighting, real number weighting,weighting on a range of numbers, or any other weighting scale. Inparticular embodiments, the model is not based on fixed weightingvalues, but rather is flexible and adjustable so that it can be refinedand tweaked to provide improved content recommendation results overtime. For instance, the relevance of returned results can be monitoredand surveyed to improve the system with new data. For example, in thecase of feedback-based weighting, a single view of a piece of contentmay yield a weighting multiplier of 1, 1.5, 2, or any other number for aviewer. Similarly, multiple views by different users may result in aweighting value for the content item of 100% relevance, 150% relevance,or any other value. Moreover, those rating values may be altereddynamically over time to improve the recommendation results.

According to various embodiments, weighting user preference and/orviewing history information based on criteria such as feedbackdetermined based on previous recommendations may allow a media system tocreate more accurate content recommendations for its users. In somecases, users may experience higher levels of engagement with the mediasystem and/or increased content consumption. In particular embodiments,user preferences may be inferred without requiring that the userexpressly indicate a preference regarding a content item. For these andother reasons, users may enjoy higher levels of satisfaction with thecontent access and management services provided by the media system.

According to various embodiments, many content recommendation techniquesinvolve matching a user's historical content interaction to thefactorized historical interactions of other users. Based at least inpart on this matching, the recommendation system may produce a list ofmedia content items to recommend to the user. Each of the media contentitems in the list may be assigned a ranking relative to other items inthe list. The ranking may reflect the strength of the recommendationand/or the degree of certainty with which the user is expected to enjoythe recommended media content item. For instance, a media content itemthat is a better match to the user's viewing history and preferencesthan another media content item may be assigned a relatively higherranking.

According to various embodiments, techniques and mechanisms describedherein may facilitate the adjustment of media content item rankingswithin a media content item recommendation list. In particularembodiments, a content recommendation technique may produce apotentially large number of rank-equivalent or approximatelyrank-equivalent recommendations. It is anticipated that many users, suchas users with similar historical content interactions, may share similarrecommendation lists that include similar sets of rank-equivalentrecommendations. In such cases, the relative success of recommendationsprovided to users with similar or approximately rank-equivalentrecommendation sets may be compared. Success for a recommendation may bebased on whether the recommendation tends to be selected for playback byusers, whether the recommendation meets a success criteria threshold,whether the recommended item tends to receive positive or negativereviews, or various other criteria. Recommendations that are consideredsuccessful for users provided with similar content recommendations maybe increased in relative ranking in future recommendation sets for otherusers. Similarly, recommendations that are considered unsuccessful forusers provided with similar content recommendations may be decreased inrelative ranking in future recommendation sets for other users.

According to various embodiments, a media system may be implemented atleast in part via a large, distributed computing environment. Ingeneral, the complexity of the recommendation procedure is positivelycorrelated with the quality of the media content recommendations thatare produced. Thus, providing accurate and timely media contentrecommendations that are personalized to the end-user may be arelatively costly operation from the standpoint of computing resourceutilization. Providing such recommendations may involve a significantamount of data mining that requires too much information and too manycomputing resources to be performed at a client machine or in an offlineenvironment. Accordingly, at least some of the recommendation processoccurs when a user is not interacting with the media content service andmay be based on information such as the user's prior interactions withthe service as well as other users' interactions with the service.

Many of the recommendation techniques are described herein withreference to content items. The recommendation techniques describedherein are widely applicable to a variety of content divisions. Forexample, a media content item may be an individual piece of content suchas a video object. As another example, a media content item may be astandardized content channel such as a television channel or apersonalized content channel created by the media system. As yet anotherexample, a media content item may be a content category such as a genre.Also, although content may be referred to herein as video content, thetechniques and mechanisms described herein are generally applicable to awide range of content and content distribution frameworks. For example,the content may be media content such as video, audio, or image content.

FIG. 1 illustrates an example of a method 100 for recommending mediacontent, performed in accordance with various techniques and mechanismsof the present invention. According to various embodiments, the method100 may be performed at a media system or at any other computing systemcapable of performing media content analysis.

In particular embodiments, the method 100 may be used to estimatepreferences for media content items. Content preferences and viewinghistory information associated with a user account may be combined withsimilar information associated with other user accounts. Then, theresulting data may be processed, analyzed, and modeled to estimatepreferences for content that has not yet been presented in associationwith a content management account. The estimated preferences may be usedto formulate recommendations for content items that a user or usersassociated with a content management account might like to view. Oneexample of the type of data that may be analyzed and/or created inconjunction with the method 100 is shown in FIG. 3.

At 102, a request to perform media content recommendation analysis isreceived. According to various embodiments, the request may be receivedat a media system such as the media systems discussed with respect toFIGS. 2, 7, and 8. Alternately, or additionally, the request may bereceived at a different computing system such as an on-demand or cloudcomputing system accessible via a network such as the Internet.

According to various embodiments, the request may be generated based onany of a variety of triggering events. For example, a user may initiatea request to perform the media content recommendation analysis. Asanother example, the request to perform the media content recommendationanalysis may be automatically generated based on a triggering event. Forinstance, the request may be generated when a sufficient amount of newpreference or viewing history data has been received, when a sufficientnumber of new users are added to the system, or when a designated timeperiod has elapsed since media content recommendation analysis has lastbeen performed.

In particular embodiments, the request may be generated based on ascheduled or periodic triggering event. For instance, media contentrecommendation analysis may be performed a designated number of times(e.g., once, twice, etc.) every minute, hour, day, week, month, or anyother time interval. According to various embodiments, the frequencywith which media content recommendation analysis is performed may bestrategically determined based on a variety of factors that may include,but are not limited to: the amount of data being analyzed, the types ofdata being analyzed, the computing resources available, the type ofanalysis being performed, the frequency with which new content is addedto the system, and the quality of the resulting recommendations. Forexample, in some systems new content is added daily, so the method 100may be performed on the order of once per day. In other systems, newcontent such as short video clips is added continuously, and at leastsome of the content may include time-sensitive information such asweather reports. In these systems, the method 100 may be performed morefrequently.

At 104, preference and viewing history data for media content isidentified. According to various embodiments, the data identified atoperation 104 may include any information relevant to forming anestimate of user preferences regarding media content. The data mayinclude, but is not limited to: content items viewed, content categoriesor genres viewed, dates and/or times when content was viewed,preferences expressed regarding content items, content channels, orcontent categories, percentages or other quantifiers for the amount of acontent item that was viewed, the number of times a content item orcategory was viewed, a location at which a content item was viewed, andthe device or devices at which a content item was viewed.

At 106, one or more operations related to pre-processing the identifieddata are performed. According to various embodiments, pre-processing mayinclude any operations related to selecting, filtering, sorting,updating, weighting, analyzing, or otherwise treating the data prior tothe performance of the primary numerical modeling used to estimatepreferences. For instance, pre-processing may involve weighting theviewing history and content preference data by time, by a number ofviews, by percent-consumed, and/or by other factors. One example of amethod for pre-processing is described with respect to FIG. 4.

In particular embodiments, pre-processing the identified data may beused to emphasize a particular attribute or attributes for relevance.For instance, viewer preferences regarding some types of media contentitems such as news reports may be sensitive to time of day. That is,users may wish to view news reports in the morning or evening, but notduring the middle of the day. Accordingly, pre-treating may be used toemphasize an attribute of the viewing data, such as time of day, thatmay be particular relevant in some or all contexts.

At 108, numerical modeling is performed on the pre-processed data.According to various embodiments, the numerical modeling may analyze thepre-processed data to estimate preferences for content. In particularembodiments, preferences may be estimated for content items that havenot yet been presented in association with a content management account.Alternately, or additionally, preferences may be estimated for contentthat has been presented, such as content that has been viewed but thatwas not rated. In many systems, numerical modeling is a computationallycomplex task that requires a relatively large amount of computingresources. For instance, numerical modeling may require the computationof matrix operations for large matrices or other such time-consumingtasks.

According to various embodiments, various types of numerical modelingmay be performed. The modeling techniques may include, but are notlimited to: log-likelihood techniques, Pearson correlation, RocchioRelevance Filtering, k-nearest neighborhood, Slope One, collaborativefiltering techniques, content-based filtering techniques, hybridrecommender techniques, Bayesian Classifiers, cluster analysis,Alternative Least Squares with Weighted Lambda Regularization,Restricted-Boltzman Machines-Gradient Boosted Decision Trees or othertypes of decision tree techniques, and artificial neural networks. Thechoice of modeling techniques may depend on factors such as the type ofdata being analyzed and the type of analysis being performed. Inparticular embodiments, modeling techniques may be strategicallydetermined based on the factors such as the relative efficacy ofdifferent techniques when applied to a particular media system, userbase, and/or data set.

At 110, the modeled data is stored. According to various embodiments,the modeled data may be stored on a storage medium within or accessibleto the media system. The modeled data may be stored so that it may beretrieved to provide content recommendations and/or to performpost-processing of the modeled data. In particular embodiments,different types of post-processing may be performed on a modeled dataset. Accordingly, the modeled data may be stored so that it can beretrieved separately for performing different types of post-processing.

At 112, post-processing of the modeled data is performed. According tovarious embodiments, post-processing of the modeled data may include anyoperations related to selecting, filtering, sorting, updating,weighting, analyzing, or otherwise treating the data after theperformance of the primary numerical modeling used to estimatepreferences.

In particular embodiments, post-processing of the modeled data may beperformed to update or edit the data for providing feedback for the nextiteration of the media content recommendation process 100. For instance,new media content preferences or viewing history information may bereceived. This information may be used to update the data identified atoperation 104. Alternately, or additionally, the new information may beused to check the validity of the recommendations produced by thenumerical modeling or post-processing operations. For example, a usermay view and/or indicate a preference for a media content itemrecommended to the user. This information may be used as positivefeedback, positively reinforcing the process or data that led to therecommendation. As another example, a user may not view or may indicatea preference against a media content item recommended to the user. Thisinformation may be used as negative feedback, negatively reinforcing theprocess or data that led to the recommendation.

In particular embodiments, post-processing of the modeled data may beperformed to provide updated recommendations based on new information.For instance, new viewing history or content preference information maybe received after numerical modeling is performed at operation 108 butbefore the method 100 is performed again. As discussed herein, numericalmodeling is in many systems a computationally complex task that requiresa relatively large amount of computing resources. Post-processing mayallow the recommendation system to provide updated recommendations basedon new information without incurring the relatively large computationalcosts associated with full numerical modeling of the data set. Forexample, post-processing may involve numerical modeling that uses asinput a limited subset of data rather than a complete data set. Asanother example, post-processing may involve a simpler form of numericalmodeling that is less computationally intense than that employed inoperation 108.

In particular embodiments, post-processing of the modeled data may beperformed to provide media content recommendations for new users of therecommendation system. For example, the recommendation method 100 may beperformed on a daily basis. After the method is performed, a new usermay join the system and view several pieces of content in the first day,before the next iteration of the recommendation method 100. In thiscase, post-processing may be used to provide the new user with contentrecommendations even before the next iteration of the recommendationmethod 100. Because the post-processing recommendation process may beless complete than the full numerical modeling performed at operation108, the post-processing procedure may provide provisionalrecommendations that are improved upon by the next iteration of thenumerical modeling process.

In particular embodiments, post-processing of the modeled data may beperformed to provide media content recommendations for different viewingpatterns associated with a single content management account. In oneexample, a content management account may be used by different membersof the same family. The father may use the account to view sportingevents, while children may use the account to view Disney movies.Accordingly, the recommendation engine may recommend a variety of mediacontent items that reflect the family members' varied tastes in content.These recommendations may be refined via post-processing based on recentviewing history. For instance, if the account is being used to watch abasketball game, then the recommendations shown after the basketballgame is viewed may be for other sporting events. If instead a pattern ofDisney movie viewing is detected, then post-processing may be used torefine the media content recommendations to select those that match thisviewing pattern.

In another example, a viewing pattern associated with a contentmanagement account may change abruptly. For instance, the contentmanagement account may be primarily used to view content typicallyenjoyed by adults, such as sporting events and news broadcasts. However,the viewing pattern may suddenly change to cartoons, such as when anadult hands a content playback device such as a tablet computer to achild. Even though this viewing pattern does not match the patternassociated with the content management account, post-processing may beused to recommend other content related to these recent viewing choices,such as other cartoons.

At 114, the post-processed data is stored. According to variousembodiments, the storing of the post-process data may be substantiallysimilar to the storing of the modeled data discussed with respect tooperation 110. The post-processed data may be stored in any way thatmakes it accessible to the recommendation for providing contentrecommendations and performing other analysis. The post-processed datamay include, for potentially many different content management accounts,estimated preferences for potentially many different media contentitems. One example of the type of data that may be analyzed, created,and stored in conjunction with the method 100 is shown in FIG. 3.

At 116, one or more content recommendations are made based on thepost-processed data. According to various embodiments, the contentrecommendations may be provided to a client machine associated with acontent management account. The content recommendations may bepersonalized according to the viewing history and content preferences ofthe content management account. The recommended content may be availablevia any content source that is accessible to the content managementaccount. In particular embodiments, the recommended content may beavailable for presentation at any of a variety of content playbackdevices associated with the content management account.

According to various embodiments, content recommendations may be madebased on one or more of a variety of factors. For example, content maybe selected based on an estimate of the degree to which the contentmatches the viewing history and content preferences of the contentmanagement account, as discussed with respect to operations 102-114. Asanother example, more time-sensitive content such as live sportingevents may be more likely to be selected than less time-sensitivecontent such as old movies.

According to various embodiments, one or more of the operations shown inFIG. 1 may be omitted. For example, in some instances pre-processing orpost-processing of the data may be omitted. As another example, in someinstances modeled data may not be stored separately from post-processeddata.

FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a system 200 that can be used withvarious techniques and mechanisms of the present invention. According tovarious embodiments, the system shown in FIG. 2 is a recommendationsystem that may be used to receive, analyze, and process data forproviding media content recommendations. The system 200 includes aproduction platform 202, Hadoop clusters 204, a data storage system 206,a recommendation engine 208, and content items 210. The system 200 ispresented at an abstract level, and many hardware and softwarecomponents that may be present in a recommendation system are omittedfor clarity. Various hardware and software components of systems,including components that are not shown in FIG. 2, are discussed withrespect to FIGS. 7 and 8.

According to various embodiments, the production platform 202 is used toprovide media content for presentation in association with manydifferent content management accounts, each of which may be associatedwith potentially many different content playback devices. The productionplatform 202 may also be used to collect and aggregate client usagedata. The client usage data may identify media content preference andviewing history information associated with the presentation of thecontent. For instance, when a user views a media content item, indicatesa liking or disliking of a media content item, or selects a recommendedcontent item for presentation, such information may be stored foranalysis.

According to various embodiments, the one or more Hadoop clusters at 204constitute a distributed computing system that allow potentially manydifferent computers to coordinate while analyzing a potentially verylarge data set. The Hadoop clusters may be used to perform various typesof data analysis such as MapReduce and deserialization. Although thesystem 200 uses Hadoop clusters, other recommendation systems may employother hardware and/or software frameworks for data analysis. Theseframeworks may include, but are not limited to: columnar orienteddatabase systems such as Cassandra, commercial large data systems suchas Teradata, and open source relational databases such as Postgres.

According to various embodiments, the data staging system 206 may beused to store data for use in conjunction with the Hadoop clusters 204.For instance, the data staging system 206 may store an HBase database ina Hive data warehouse system. Alternately, the data staging system 206may employ a different data storage and/or management system.

According to various embodiments, the recommendation engine 208 may beused to process the staged data for providing media contentrecommendations. The recommendation engine 208 may be used to performany of a variety of operations related to recommendation. For example,the recommendation engine 208 may be used to perform a machine learningalgorithm such as an algorithm performed via the Apache Mahoutframework. As another example, the recommendation engine 208 may be usedto perform numerical modeling, as discussed with respect to operation106 shown in FIG. 1. As yet another example, the recommendation engine208 may be used to perform pre-processing operations such as weightingviewing history and/or content preferences by a number of views, by apercentage or amount of a content item that was viewed, by the date ortime when a content item was viewed, or by some other factor.

According to various embodiments, the content recommendations at 210 maybe selected based on the analysis performed at the recommendation engine208 or elsewhere in the recommendation system. The contentrecommendations may be provided to a user of a content playback deviceassociated with a content management account. Based at least in part onthe content recommendations, a user may select content for presentationon the content playback device or on another device. Providing contentto the content playback device may be performed via the productionplatform 202. Additionally, information regarding media contentpreferences and viewing history related to the content recommendationsprovided at 210 may be stored as client usage data in the productionplatform 202 and used to provide updated media content recommendations.

FIG. 3 illustrates an example of a media content preference data andrecommendation chart 300. According to various embodiments, the chart300 includes information regarding media content preferences and viewinghistory for various user accounts. The chart 300 includes the contentitem columns 304-310, the user account column 302, the user account rows312-320, and the content preference data cells 322 and 324.

According to various embodiments, the user account column 302 includesidentifiers for user accounts. User accounts are also referred to hereinas content management accounts. Each user account may be associated withone or more users of a content management system. Although only fiveuser accounts are shown in FIG. 5, an actual data set may include anynumber of user accounts. For instance, many data sets include hundredsof thousands or millions of different accounts.

According to various embodiments, the content item columns 304-310 areeach associated with a different media content item or content category.Each of the media content items may be analyzed by the recommendationsystem for the purposes of providing recommendations to the useraccounts. In particular embodiments, not all of the media content itemsmay be available to each user account. For instance, users of the mediarecommendation system may receive content from different sources, suchas broadcast television and on-demand services such as Netflix. In thiscase, some users may have access to some content sources but not toother content sources.

According to various embodiments, each of the user account rows 312-320includes a number of content preference data cells that correspond todifferent content items. Content preference data cells may be used tostore any of various types of information. This information may include,but is not limited to: expressed preferences regarding a content item(e.g., a number of stars), a percent consumed of a content item, alocation at which a content item was viewed, a date or time at which acontent item was consumed, and a number of times that a content item wasviewed.

According to various embodiments, various types of values may be storedwithin each of the media content data cells. For example, the data cell322 stores a “1”, which may indicate an expressed preference, a percentconsumed, or some other viewing history or content preferenceinformation related to the first content item 304. As another example,the data cell 324 is blank, indicating that the content item has not yetbeen viewed in association with the fourth user account 318. As yetanother example, data cells may be updated to include estimated valuescalculated by the media recommendation system.

According to various embodiments, the media recommendation system maycalculate estimated values for any or selected ones of the blank datacells. For instance, the media recommendation system may calculateestimated values for all blank data cells associated with a useraccount, for all blank data cells associated with a user account, forall blank data cells associated with content items to which a useraccount has access, or for any other set of data cells.

According to various embodiments, media content preference andrecommendation data may appear significantly different than the chart300 shown in FIG. 3. For instance, in some techniques, specific datavalue estimates may be created for unviewed content items. Alternately,or additionally, data value estimates may be stored as differencesbetween pairs in a sparse matrix, which may facilitate the rapidcalculation of data value estimates for newly added content items.

FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a method 400 for pre-processing mediacontent recommendation data. According to various embodiments, themethod 400 may be performed at a media system. The method 400 may beinitiated when a request to pre-process data is generated, as discussedwith respect to operation 106 in FIG. 1. The method 400 may be used toweight, filter, sort, aggregate, analyze, or otherwise process contentpreference and viewing history data prior to performing numericalanalysis.

At 402, raw data for conducting pre-processing is identified. Accordingto various embodiments, various types of data may be analyzed. Forinstance, the raw data may be similar to that discussed with respect toFIGS. 1 and 3. That is, the raw data may identify viewing history orcontent preference information associated with potentially manydifferent content management accounts. Each content management accountmay be associated with different data for potentially many differentcontent items or content categories that have been viewed in associationwith the account.

At 404, the raw data is aggregated according to a primary dimension.According to various embodiments, the primary dimension may be anattribute or view of the data that is selected for emphasizing. Forinstance, the primary dimension may be a number of views of a contentitem, a percentage of a content item that has been viewed, or aweighting factor to be applied based on the secondary dimension. At 406,the raw data is aggregated according to a secondary dimension. Accordingto various embodiments, a variety of dimensions may be used for eitherthe primary or secondary dimensions. These dimensions may include, butare not limited to: a distance in the past that the viewing occurred, anumber of views, a percentage viewed, an absolute or relativegeo-location, a time of day, whether the content item viewed wasrecommended by the recommendation system, or any other relevantdimensions.

In particular embodiments, the primary and secondary dimensions may bethought of as axes of a graph, such as the graphs shown in FIGS. 5A and5B. In this case, the primary dimension may be analogous to the y-axison the graph, while the secondary dimension may be analogous to thex-axis on the graph. Each data point on the graph may represent aviewing event. Each viewing event may identify a content item viewed aswell as the content management account associated with the viewingevent. The data points may then be located on the graph according to theprimary and secondary dimensions. When the secondary dimension includesa weighting factor to be applied based on a value associated with theprimary dimension, as is the case in time of day analysis, then eachdata point may be positioned at a respective location on the x-axis, asshown in FIG. 5A. When instead the primary dimension includes a non-zerodata value, such as a number of views greater than zero, then each datapoint may be located at a position above the x-axis, as shown in FIG.5B.

In a first example, the primary dimension may be a weighting factor andthe secondary dimension may be a time of day that a content item wasviewed. In this case, each data point may identify a particular contentitem presented to a particular user account. These data points may besorted

At 408, one or more transforms for applying to the aggregated data areselected. According to various embodiments, the transforms may beselected to emphasize an attribute or quality of the aggregated data.Each transform may be a mathematical alteration or adjustment to theaggregated data values. For instance, a transform may impose a maximumor minimum value, a linear transformation, an affine transformation, aquadratic or other polynomial transformation, or any other type oftransformation.

In particular embodiments, transformations may be strategicallydetermined based on their efficacy in producing reliablerecommendations. For instance, once a number of views for a content itemexceeds a designated threshold value, the view count may cease to be ahelpful indicator of the strength of the preference and may insteadunduly weight the recommendations toward the viewed content item. Inthis case, a transform may cap the number of views at the designatedthreshold, thus reducing the problem of excessive weight being given tothe content item in the numerical modeling phase.

At 410, the selected transforms are applied to the aggregated data.According to various embodiments, applying the selected transforms mayinvolve conducting a numerical operation on the aggregated data toadjust it in accordance with the selected transforms. The transforms maybe applied sequentially or all once. In particular embodiments, theorder for applying the transforms may be strategically determined basedon the efficacy of the ordering in producing reliable estimates.

At 412, a determination is made as to whether to aggregate the raw dataaccording to an additional secondary dimension. At 414, a determinationis made as to whether to aggregate the raw data according to anadditional primary dimension. According to various embodiments, data maybe aggregated according to various numbers of primary and secondarydimensions. For instance, content items may be aggregated andtransformed first by time of day and then by geo-location to separatelyemphasize both of these attributes or qualities.

At 416, the transformed data is combined for numerical modeling.According to various embodiments, combining the transformed data may beperformed to unify the transformations performed in FIG. 4. For example,a particular content rating may have been scaled down because thecontent was viewed long in the past. At the same time, the same contentrating may have been scaled up because it was viewed at a particulartime of day. As another example, different dimensions may matterdifferently at different times of the day, different geo-locations,different relative locations, or according to differences in otherfactors. Combining the transformed data may involve reconciling theseoperations to produce a unified data set that can be modeledeffectively.

At 418, the transformed data is stored. According to variousembodiments, the transformed data may be stored in a way that makes itaccessible for performing numerical modeling, as discussed in relationto FIG. 1. For instance, the transformed data may be transformed in adatabase located in a data staging system, as discussed in relation toFIG. 2.

According to various embodiments, various choices involved in datapre-processing may depend on the factors such as the specific mediasystem, data set, and user base being analyzed. For instance, thedimensions along which to aggregate data, the transforms to apply to theaggregated data, the order in which to apply the transforms, and thetechniques used to store and blend the transformed data may each varyaccording to various factors. Accordingly, the specific choices forthese techniques may be strategically determined based on a variety offactors to improve the efficacy of the recommendation process.

FIGS. 5A-5C illustrate examples of charts depicting pre-treated data.According to various embodiments, the charts shown in FIGS. 5A-5C maydepict the type of weighting operations that may be performed duringpre-processing, as discussed with respect to FIG. 4. In particularembodiments, the axes shown on the graphs in FIGS. 5A-5C may correspondto dimensions identified in operations 404 and 406 shown in FIG. 4.

According to various embodiments, each of the data points shown in FIGS.5A-5C may identify at least a media content item and a contentmanagement account. In some cases, data points may identify otherinformation, such as a number of views associated with the content item,a percent of the content item that has been consumed, a time of day thatthe media content item was viewed, or any other information. For thepurposes of illustration, it will be assumed that each of the datapoints shown in FIGS. 5A-5C is associated with the same contentmanagement account.

These charts are presented in order to better elucidate varioustechniques and mechanisms described herein and need not be actuallyproduced during the recommendation process. Additionally, the datapresented on the charts are significantly simplified in comparison withactual data in most recommendation systems. For instance, each of thecharts shown in FIGS. 5A-5C includes three data points, while data setsused in many recommendation systems may include hundreds of thousands oreven hundreds of millions of data points.

In addition, the pre-processing and transformations shown in FIGS. 5A-5Care only simple examples of the types of pre-processing andtransformations that may be performed in accordance with techniques andmechanisms described herein. Specific transformations may in many casesbe much more complex. Also, transformations may be strategicallydetermined based on a number of factors, including but not limited tothe efficacy of specific transformations in producing reliablerecommendations for a given media system, user base, and data set.

In FIG. 5A, the data points are aggregated and weighted by time of day.The chart shown in FIG. 5A includes a Y-axis 502, an X-axis 504, datapoints 514-518, and a transform 520. FIG. 5A shows an arrangement of thedata points and the result of the transformation of the data by atransform function, as discussed with respect to operation 410 shown inFIG. 4.

The chart shown in FIG. 5A corresponds to a transformation applied tonews-related content items. It is anticipated that news-related contentitems may be time-sensitive in nature. That is, many users may tend toregularly view preferred news-related content such as news broadcasttelevision programs in the morning or evening. In contrast, when usersview news-related content at other times, the content may simply reflectsome topical interest that does not reflect a strong preference for thecontent. Accordingly, it is anticipated that news programs viewed duringthe morning and evening may better reflect a user's preferences andtastes than news-related content viewed at other times. The transformshown in FIG. 5A may be used to adjust the weighting of content toreflect this anticipated preference pattern.

In particular embodiments, the data points included in a particulartransformation need not include all data points available to the systemor all data points associated with particular content managementaccounts. For instance, the transformation shown in FIG. 5A is directedprimarily to news-related content, since other content may not reflecttime-sensitive preferences in quite the same fashion. Accordingly, thetransformation shown in FIG. 5A may be applied to news-related contentitems but not to other content items.

Each of the data points 514-518 represents a viewing event. Each datapoint identifies a media content item that was viewed, a contentmanagement account that was associated with the viewing, and a time ofday that the media content item was viewed. In some cases, each datapoint may identify additional information. However, not all informationassociated with each data point is shown in FIG. 5A.

The X-axis 504 represents a time of day at which a content itemassociated with a data point was viewed. For instance, the media contentassociated with the data point 514 was viewed in the early morning,around 2:00 am. The media content associated with the data point 516 wasviewed in mid-morning, around 9:00 am. The media content associated withthe data point 518 was viewed in the early evening, at 6:00 pm.

The Y-axis 502 represents a weighting factor that is assigned by atransform. Prior to transformation, the different data points shown inFIG. 5 were weighted equally and thus treated as having equalsignificance. That is, each of the views of content items are treatedequally when estimating user preferences and identifying unviewedcontent to recommend for viewing in association with the contentmanagement account. After the transformation, different data points maybe weighted differently. For instance, in FIG. 5A, content items thatwere viewed around 6:00 A.M. and 6:00 P.M. may be treated as moresignificant than other content items.

In FIG. 5B, the data points are aggregated and weighted by the number oftimes that each content item has been viewed. The chart shown in FIG. 5Bincludes the X-axis 522, the Y-axis 524, the data points 526-530, andthe transformation 532. FIG. 5B shows an arrangement of the data pointsand the result of the transformation of the data by a transformfunction, as discussed with respect to operation 410 shown in FIG. 4.

The chart shown in FIG. 5B represents a view-weighted transformation. Itis anticipated that a user who views one content item many timestypically prefers it to another content item that the user views onlyonce. Accordingly, the significance of a user's viewing of a contentitem in the recommendation engine may be weighted by the number of timesthat the user has viewed the content. For instance, an initial weightingfactor may weight each content item by the number of times it wasviewed. However, such a weighting may in some instances result in skewedinferences regarding user preferences. For instance, if a user views acontent item such as a television news program or a humorous web videoclip 60 times, a simple linear weighting factor may unduly skew theresults toward content that is similar to the frequently-viewed content.Accordingly, a transformation may be applied that adjusts the weightingfactor. For instance, the transformation function may cap the weightingfactor at the high and and/or make other adjustments to the weightingfactor.

Each of the data points 526-530 represents a viewing event. Each datapoint identifies a media content item that was viewed, a contentmanagement account that was associated with the viewing, and a number oftimes that the media content item was viewed. In some cases, each datapoint may identify additional information. However, not all informationassociated with each data point is shown in FIG. 5B.

In particular embodiments, a media content item need not be anindividual media content object such as a video. Instead, a mediacontent item may be a television program, a content channel such as atelevision channel, or a content genre. Thus, an data point indicatingthat a media content item was viewed 20 times, for instance, mayrepresent the repeated viewing of a news program or a television channeland not necessarily the repeated viewing of a single media contentobject. In particular embodiments, the scope of a data point may bechanged and/or strategically determine to accommodate variousrecommendation applications.

The X-Axis 524 represents a number of views associated with each datapoint. For instance, the data point 526 is associated with a mediacontent item that has been viewed 20 times, the data point 528 with amedia content item that has been viewed 10 times, and the data point 530with a media content item that has been viewed 5 times.

The Y-axis 522 represents a weighting factor that is affected by atransformation. Initially, the weighting factor for a given data pointin FIG. 5B is the number of views associated with the content itemrepresented by the data point. For instance, if a media content item isviewed 20 times, then it is assigned a weighting factor of 20, whereas amedia content item that has been viewed once would be assigned aweighting factor of 0.

The transformation 532 is applied to the data points to adjust theweighting factors. Initially, the transformation 532 caps the weightingfactor that can be applied to any data point at 15. That is, a user maycontinue to view a media content item more than 15 times, but theview-weight that is applied to the data point does not exceed 15. Thetransformation 532 then does not affect the weight associated with thedata point 528, while it increases the weighting factor associated withthe data point 530.

In FIG. 5C, the data points are aggregated and weighted by thepercentage of each content item that has been presented. The chart shownin FIG. 5C includes the X-axis 542, the Y-axis 540, the data points544-548, and the transformation 550. FIG. 5C shows an arrangement of thedata points and the result of the transformation of the data by atransform function, as discussed with respect to operation 410 shown inFIG. 4.

The chart shown in FIG. 5C reflects a percent consumed weightedtransformation. It is anticipated that a viewer who views a greaterpercentage of one content item than another typically, and generally,prefers the first content item to the second. Accordingly, thesignificance of a data point in a recommendation system may be weightedaccording to the percentage of the associated content item that waspresented to a user. However, it is anticipated that some differences inpercentage viewed do not reflect differences in preferences. Forinstance, the final portion of some content items includes a creditssequence. For this and other reasons, some viewers may simply choose notto view the final portion of a content item. Thus, a viewer who watches100% of one content item while only viewing 95% of another content itemmay not actually prefer the first content item to the second.Accordingly, a transformation may be applied to adjust the weightingvalues to reflect this and other user preferences patterns.

Each of the data points 544-548 represents a viewing event. Each datapoint identifies a media content item that was viewed, a contentmanagement account that was associated with the viewing, and apercentage or portion of the media content item that was viewed orpresented. In some cases, each data point may identify additionalinformation. However, not all information associated with each datapoint is shown in FIG. 5C.

The X-Axis 542 represents a percentage or portion of a content item thatwas viewed or presented. For instance, the data point 544 is associatedwith a media content item of which 85% was viewed, the data point 546with a media content item of which 50% was viewed, and the data point548 with a media content item of which 25% was viewed.

The Y-axis 544 represents a weighting factor that is affected by atransformation. Initially, the weighting factor for a given data pointin FIG. 5B is the percentage of the content item represented by the datapoint that was presented in association with the content managementaccount. For instance, if 100% of a media content item is presented,then it is assigned a weighting factor of 1, whereas a media contentitem of which only 25% has been viewed once would be assigned aweighting factor of 0.25.

The transformation 550 is applied to the data points to adjust theweighting factors. Initially, the transformation 550 scales up theweighting factor for media content items for which 75-100% of the itemhas been presented. That is, if 75-100% of a media content item ispresented, then a weighting factor of 1 will be applied, effectivelytreating the media content item as if 100% of the item had beenpresented. Accordingly, the weighting factor for the data point 544 isscaled up to 100%. This part of the transformation reflects the ideathat if a viewer watches nearly all of a media content item, he or shemay be inferred to like it, and that small differences in high viewedpercentages likely do not reflect differences in preferences.

Then, the transformation 550 scales the weighting factors for other datapoints, such as the data point 546. The data point 546 is associatedwith a content item of which 50% has been viewed, and its weightingfactor is scaled down somewhat. This part of the transform reflects theidea that a viewer who stops viewing a content item halfway through maybe estimated to have a relatively weak preference for the content item.

Finally, the transformation 550 scales down the weighting factor formedia content items for which 0-25% of the item has been presented. Forinstance, the data point 548 is associated with a media content item ofwhich 25% has been viewed. However, the weighting factor for the mediacontent item is scaled down from 0.25 to 0. This part of thetransformation reflects the idea that when a user watches very little ofa media content item and then stops viewing it, the viewer may beinferred to not like the content item. Accordingly, small differences inthe percentages of content items for which viewing is quickly terminatedmay not matter in the calculation of new recommendations.

FIG. 6 illustrates a method 600 for providing feedback-based weightingcontent recommendations. According to various embodiments, a higherweighting may be assigned to the pieces, types, categories, channels,and/or genres of content that have been viewed after being recommendedto viewers. In this way, the baseline mathematical algorithms thatcalculate the returned recommendation results may yield a higherpercentage of more accurate and more relevant content for the viewer.

According to various embodiments, the method 600 may be used topositively and/or negatively reinforce various portions of therecommendation procedure. For instance, if a particular contentrecommendation is successful, then the significance of the recommendedcontent item may be boosted during a subsequent iteration of therecommendation procedure. However, if a particular contentrecommendation is unsuccessful, then the significance of the recommendedcontent item may be reduced during a subsequent iteration of therecommendation procedure.

According to various embodiments, the success or failure of arecommendation may be determined in any of various ways. For example, arecommended content item that is selected for viewing by a user may becounted as a success. As another example, a recommended content itemthat is selected and viewed to at least a designated percentage ofcompletion (e.g., 60%) may be counted as a success. However, arecommended content item that is selected for viewing but only a smallportion of which is actually viewed (e.g., less than 30%) may be countedas a failure. As yet another example, a recommended content item that isselected for viewing by a relatively large number of users may becounted as a success. In particular embodiments, the success or failureof a recommendation may be strategically determined based on factorssuch as which types of recommendations are helpful for providingreinforcement to the recommendation system and how user actions tend tocorrespond to user preferences.

According to various embodiments, feedback received regarding anactivated recommendation may be used in various ways by therecommendation system. For example, the feedback may be used to add orremove a cap or limit on a weighting value applied to a content item. Asanother example, the feedback may be used to increase or decrease aweighting value applied to a content item. As yet another example, thefeedback may be used to act as a multiplier to a weighting value createdbased on another factor, such as a percentage viewed or a view count. Asstill another example, the feedback may be used as input to a weightingvalue function based on any of various factors. For instance, anactivated recommendation may be used to generate a weighting value for acontent item based on the percentage of the recommended content itemthat was viewed.

According to various embodiments, the method 600 may be used toreinforce the recommendation process for users exhibiting similarviewing history and preference data. For instance, a content item may berecommended to a group of viewers exhibiting similar tastes. If therecommendation proves to be successful with the original group ofviewers, then it may be provided to a larger group of viewers. However,if the recommendation does not succeed, then it may be deemphasized insubsequent iterations of the recommendation procedure.

According to various embodiments, operations shown in the method 600 maybe performed at various stages in the recommendation process. Forexample, some operations may be performed during the post-processing ofmodeled data discussed with respect to operation 112 shown in FIG. 1.For instance, user feedback for recommendations that have been actedupon may be stored for further analysis. As another example, someoperations may be performed during the pre-processing of preference andviewing history data described with respect to operation 106. Forinstance, weighting values may be applied to the data points associatedwith the user feedback.

According to various embodiments, the method 600 may be performed at amedia system, such as the systems discussed with respect to FIGS. 2 andFIGS. 7-9. The method 600 may be performed in conjunction with apre-processing method, such as the method 400 discussed with respect toFIG. 4. For example, various operations discussed in FIG. 6 may act aselaborations or specific instances of operations discussed with respectto FIG. 4. As another example, various operations discussed with respectto FIG. 6 may be performed in addition to, or instead of, operationsdiscussed with respect to FIG. 4. Alternately, or additionally, themethod 600 or various portions thereof may be performed during apost-processing operation such as that discussed with respect tooperation 112 in FIG. 1.

At 602, viewing history and preference data for media content isidentified. According to various embodiments, the identification ofviewing history and preference data at operation 602 may besubstantially similar to the identification of such information atoperations 104 and 402 discussed with respect to FIGS. 1 and 4. Theviewing history and preference data may include information identifyinga number of views, a time viewed, and/or a percentage viewed for contentitems presented in association with content management accounts.

According to various embodiments, the viewing history and preferencedata may identify whether a content item was previously recommended to aviewer. For instance, a content item may be selected for recommendationduring a previous iteration of the media content recommendation method100 shown in FIG. 1. Then, the recommendation may be presented to theviewer in a user interface. In some instances, a recommendation may beacted upon by a user. For instance, a user may select the recommendedcontent item for presentation on a content device. The user may thenview the entire content item or only a portion of the content item. Suchinformation may be used to positively or negatively reinforce therecommendation procedure.

For example, the viewing history and preference data may include a datapoint indicating that a particular content item was recommended to aviewer and that the viewer selected the content item for presentation.The data point may also indicate information such as whether the entirecontent item was presented or whether only a portion of the content itemwas presented. When only a portion of the content item was presented,the data point may identify a portion of the content item that waspresented, such as 10% or 65%.

At 604, content items are identified for weighting by feedback. Acontent item identified for weighting by feedback may be any individualmedia object, media category or genre, or media channel capable of beinganalyzed by the recommendation system. For example, a media content itemmay be an individual piece of content such as a video object. As anotherexample, a media content item may be a standardized content channel suchas a television channel or a personalized content channel created by themedia system. As yet another example, a media content item may be acontent category such as a genre.

In particular embodiments, an activated recommendation may be requiredto meet a designated feedback data threshold value before being used forrecommendation engine reinforcement purposes. For example, thedesignated feedback data threshold may be a percent completed of atleast 40% or a time viewed of at least 20 minutes. As another example,the threshold may specify a proportion of viewers who selected thecontent, such as at least 25% of viewers who were provided with thecontent recommendation. In particular embodiments, the designatedthreshold may be the same for each content item included in a condition.Alternately, different content items may be associated with differentthresholds.

According to various embodiments, various criteria may be used forselecting content items to weight by feedback. These criteria mayinclude, but are not limited to: whether a recommended content item wasselected by a user, whether a recommended content item is associatedwith user feedback, whether a content item has been expressly rated by auser, whether a content item falls under a given category or genre,whether a content item meets a designated length threshold, and whethera content item is of a particular content item type.

In particular embodiments, some types of content items may be suitablefor weighting by feedback, while others may not be. For example, contentitems such as movies or television programs may be suitable forweighting by view count. That is, a recommendation for a movie that isselected for viewing by a user and of which a large percentage ispresented to the user may be counted as a successful recommendation. Inthis case, and the recommendation procedure that led to therecommendation may be reinforced. As another example, some types ofcontent items such as a topical news program may be less suitable forfeedback-based recommendation. For instance, a user may select theprogram based on the topics featured rather than a preference for theparticular news program.

In particular embodiments, content items may be selected based at leastin part on whether a user has expressly rated the content item. Forinstance, if a user expresses a preference of three out of a total offive possible “stars” for a content item, then user may be said to nothave expressed a strong preference for or against the content item.Accordingly, weighting the feedback to reinforce the recommendationprocedure may be unnecessary. However, if the user expresses a strongpreference for or against a content item, the user's preference may betreated as feedback for positively or negatively reinforcing the usageof the content item in the recommendation techniques that gave rise tothe recommendation.

At 606, viewer feedback for each of the identified content items isidentified. According to various embodiments, the viewer feedback mayidentify any information indicating a user response to a content item.For example, the viewer feedback may identify a percentage of thecontent item that was presented, such as 25% or 100%. As anotherexample, the viewer feedback may identify a number of times that therecommended content item was presented in association with a contentmanagement account. As yet another example, the viewer feedback mayidentify a date or time of day that the recommended content item waspresented in association with a content management account.

In particular embodiments, the type of viewer feedback identified for acontent item may be strategically determined based on which types offeedback are most relevant. For example, content such as sportsbroadcasts may be time sensitive, so time-related information such asthe date on which the content was viewed may be identified. As anotherexample, a view count may particularly relevant for content such as abroadcast television channel. As yet another example, the percentage ofa content item that was presented may help determine whether therecommendation was successful. For instance, a high percentage viewed,such as 85%, may be treated as a successful recommendation, while a lowpercentage viewed, such as 2%, may be treated as an unsuccessfulrecommendation.

At 608, a weighting value for each content item is determined based onthe associated feedback. According to various embodiments, the weightingvalue may be implemented in terms of percentage weighting, integerweighting, real number weighting, weighting on a range of numbers, orany other weighting scale. For example, the initial weighting value maybe a fixed multiplier such as 2 that is applied to every recommendedcontent item of which at least a designated percentage was viewed. Asanother example, the initial weighting value may be related toinformation such as the percentage of the content item that was viewedor the number of times the content item was viewed. For instance, theinitial weighting value may be set to a number such as two or three,multiplied by the percentage of the content item that was viewed. Inparticular embodiments, the techniques used to determine the weightingvalue may be strategically determined based on factors such as the typeof numerical analysis performed in the recommendation system, the typeof weighting values used in the numerical analysis, and the data setbeing analyzed.

In particular embodiments, a weighting value may map onto an expresspreference rating. For instance, if no express rating is provided for amedia content item, a rating may be inferred based on viewer feedback.For example, when a designated percentage of a recommended content itemis viewed, the content item may be assigned an associated preferencerating, such as five out of five stars. The designated percentage may be50%, 90%, or any other percentage.

At 610, one or more transformations to apply to the weighting values areidentified. According to various embodiments, a transformation mayadjust or emphasize the weighting values based on variousconsiderations. For example, the initial weighting value may be a fixedmultiplier for each content item for which over a designated percentagewas presented. Then, the transformation may adjust the weighting valuesto reflect other information such as a number of times that the contentitem was viewed. For instance, the initial weighting value may beincreased for content items that were viewed many times. As anotherexample, the initial weighting value may be correlated with thepercentage viewed of a content item. Then, a transformation may adjustthe weighting values to apply a maximum or minimum value to the initialweighting values. For instance, an initial weighting value may be set totwice the percentage viewed. Then, a transformation may be applied tolimit the maximum weighting value to 1.5.

At 612, the identified transformations are applied to the weightingvalue. According to various embodiments, the application of thetransformations to the content items may be substantially similar to theoperation 410 discussed with respect to FIG. 4.

At 614, one or more content recommendations are made based on theweighting values. According to various embodiments, various techniquesmay be used to make the content recommendations. For example, data fromfeedback-based weighting may be combined with data from other types ofpre-processing, as discussed with respect to operation 416 in FIG. 4.For instance, data from feedback-based weighting may be combined withdata from percent-viewed, view-count, or time-viewed weighting. Then,operations such as numerical modeling, post-processing, and contentrecommendation may be performed, as discussed with respect to operations108, 112, and 116 in FIG. 1.

At 616, a determination is made as to whether to refine thefeedback-based weighting analysis. According to various embodiments, thetechniques employed in one or more operations discussed with respect toFIG. 6, such as operations 604, 608, 610, and 612 may be adjusted basedon various types of information. For instance, successfulrecommendations may be used to reinforce or enhance the feedback-basedweighting techniques used, while unsuccessful recommendations may beused to change or de-emphasize the feedback-based weighting techniquesused. That is, techniques involved in operations such as selectingcontent items for weighting, applying weight based on feedback, andtransforming the weighting values may be adjusted based on informationsuch as whether evidence suggests that users agreed or disagreed withprevious recommendations.

According to various embodiments, the determination as to whether torefine feedback-based weighting analysis may be made based on any ofvarious factors. These factors may include, but are not limited to: theamount of new information available to the recommendation system, thenumber of recommendations that have been acted upon, and the amount oftime that has passed since the recommendations were made.

At 618, the viewing history and preference data is updated. According tovarious embodiments, the updated viewing history and preference data mayinclude various types of information not included in the originalviewing history and preference data identified at operation 602. Forexample, the updated viewing history and preference data may includeupdated feedback or information regarding content newly watched byusers. As another example, the updated data may indicate whether a useracted upon a recommendation made at operation 614 as well as any dataregarding the user's reaction to the recommended content. The updateddata may be used to adjust the techniques used to apply feedback-basedweighting values to the content items and to transform the weightingvalues.

In particular embodiments, the viewing history and preference data maybe updated based on user input. For instance, a user may reviewaggregated data regarding the success of various types of contentrecommendations and then dynamically alter or adjust techniques such asthose used to weight content by feedback or to transform the weightingvalues.

At 620, the success of the content recommendations is evaluated.According to various embodiments, the updated data may includeinformation indicative of content recommendation outcomes. For example,if a user ignored a recommendation made at operation 614, then therecommendation may be associated with a neutral or negative outcome. Ifa user selected a recommendation made at operation 614 but rated therecommended content item poorly or stopped viewing it after only a shortperiod of time, the recommendation may be associated with a negativeoutcome. If a user selected a recommendation made at operation 614 andrated the recommended content item highly or viewed it nearly in itsentirety, the recommendation may be associated with a positive outcome.

At 622, the weighting value determination and transformationidentification procedures are adjusted. According to variousembodiments, any or all of the techniques described with respect tooperations 604, 608, 610, and 612 may be adjusted based on the successof the content recommendations. For example, depending on whetherrecommendations are more or less successful, initial weighting valuesfor various types of content items and content feedback may be increasedor decreased. As another example, the types of transformations or ordersin which they are applied may be adjusted. For instance, a maximumweighting value may be increased or decreased. As yet another example,various types of content items may be selected or not selected forweighting by view count based on information such as the success of therecommendations produced from including or excluding them. Accordingly,the techniques for performing view-weighting in the recommendationsystem may be updated flexibly and dynamically.

FIG. 7 is a diagrammatic representation illustrating one example of afragment or segment system 701 associated with a content server that maybe used in a broadcast and unicast distribution network. Encoders 705receive media data from satellite, content libraries, and other contentsources and sends RTP multicast data to fragment writer 709. Theencoders 705 also send session announcement protocol (SAP) announcementsto SAP listener 721. According to various embodiments, the fragmentwriter 709 creates fragments for live streaming, and writes files todisk for recording. The fragment writer 709 receives RTP multicaststreams from the encoders 705 and parses the streams to repackage theaudio/video data as part of fragmented MPEG-4 files. When a new programstarts, the fragment writer 709 creates a new MPEG-4 file on fragmentstorage and appends fragments. In particular embodiments, the fragmentwriter 709 supports live and/or DVR configurations.

The fragment server 711 provides the caching layer with fragments forclients. The design philosophy behind the client/server applicationprogramming interface (API) minimizes round trips and reduces complexityas much as possible when it comes to delivery of the media data to theclient 715. The fragment server 711 provides live streams and/or DVRconfigurations.

The fragment controller 707 is connected to application servers 703 andcontrols the fragmentation of live channel streams. The fragmentationcontroller 707 optionally integrates guide data to drive the recordingsfor a global/network DVR. In particular embodiments, the fragmentcontroller 707 embeds logic around the recording to simplify thefragment writer 709 component. According to various embodiments, thefragment controller 707 will run on the same host as the fragment writer709. In particular embodiments, the fragment controller 707 instantiatesinstances of the fragment writer 709 and manages high availability.

According to various embodiments, the client 715 uses a media componentthat requests fragmented MPEG-4 files, allows trick-play, and managesbandwidth adaptation. The client communicates with the applicationservices associated with HTTP proxy 713 to get guides and present theuser with the recorded content available.

FIG. 8 illustrates one example of a fragmentation system 801 that can beused for video-on-demand (VoD) content. Fragger 803 takes an encodedvideo clip source. However, the commercial encoder does not create anoutput file with minimal object oriented framework (MOOF) headers andinstead embeds all content headers in the movie file (MOOV). The fraggerreads the input file and creates an alternate output that has beenfragmented with MOOF headers, and extended with custom headers thatoptimize the experience and act as hints to servers.

The fragment server 811 provides the caching layer with fragments forclients. The design philosophy behind the client/server API minimizesround trips and reduces complexity as much as possible when it comes todelivery of the media data to the client 815. The fragment server 811provides VoD content.

According to various embodiments, the client 815 uses a media componentthat requests fragmented MPEG-4 files, allows trick-play, and managesbandwidth adaptation. The client communicates with the applicationservices associated with HTTP proxy 813 to get guides and present theuser with the recorded content available.

FIG. 9 illustrates one example of a server. According to particularembodiments, a system 900 suitable for implementing particularembodiments of the present invention includes a processor 901, a memory903, an interface 911, and a bus 915 (e.g., a PCI bus or otherinterconnection fabric) and operates as a streaming server. When actingunder the control of appropriate software or firmware, the processor 901is responsible for modifying and transmitting live media data to aclient. Various specially configured devices can also be used in placeof a processor 901 or in addition to processor 901. The interface 911 istypically configured to send and receive data packets or data segmentsover a network.

Particular examples of interfaces supported include Ethernet interfaces,frame relay interfaces, cable interfaces, DSL interfaces, token ringinterfaces, and the like. In addition, various very high-speedinterfaces may be provided such as fast Ethernet interfaces, GigabitEthernet interfaces, ATM interfaces, HSSI interfaces, POS interfaces,FDDI interfaces and the like. Generally, these interfaces may includeports appropriate for communication with the appropriate media. In somecases, they may also include an independent processor and, in someinstances, volatile RAM. The independent processors may controlcommunications-intensive tasks such as packet switching, media controland management.

According to various embodiments, the system 900 is a server that alsoincludes a transceiver, streaming buffers, and a program guide database.The server may also be associated with subscription management, loggingand report generation, and monitoring capabilities. In particularembodiments, the server can be associated with functionality forallowing operation with mobile devices such as cellular phones operatingin a particular cellular network and providing subscription managementcapabilities. According to various embodiments, an authentication moduleverifies the identity of devices including mobile devices. A logging andreport generation module tracks mobile device requests and associatedresponses. A monitor system allows an administrator to view usagepatterns and system availability. According to various embodiments, theserver handles requests and responses for media content relatedtransactions while a separate streaming server provides the actual mediastreams.

Although a particular server is described, it should be recognized thata variety of alternative configurations are possible. For example, somemodules such as a report and logging module and a monitor may not beneeded on every server. Alternatively, the modules may be implemented onanother device connected to the server. In another example, the servermay not include an interface to an abstract buy engine and may in factinclude the abstract buy engine itself. A variety of configurations arepossible.

In the foregoing specification, the invention has been described withreference to specific embodiments. However, one of ordinary skill in theart appreciates that various modifications and changes can be madewithout departing from the scope of the invention as set forth in theclaims below. Accordingly, the specification and figures are to beregarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense, and allsuch modifications are intended to be included within the scope ofinvention.

1. A method comprising: identifying input data for performing mediacontent recommendation analysis, the input data describing thepresentation of a plurality of media content items in association with aplurality of content management accounts, the input data comprising aplurality of data points, each of the data points identifying arespective time viewed for a respective one of the media content itemspresented in association with a respective one of the content managementaccounts, the time viewed identifying a date or time of day that themedia content item has been presented in association with the contentmanagement account; for each or selected ones of the data points,applying a respective weighting factor based on the respective timeviewed for the respective media content item presented in associationwith the respective content management account; and storing on a storagesystem a plurality of media content recommendations produced bynumerically modeling the weighted input data, each of the media contentrecommendations identifying a respective one of the media content itemsand a respective one of the content management accounts.
 2. The methodrecited in claim 1, wherein the plurality of data points includes afirst data point that identifies a first time viewed for a first contentitem viewed in association with a first one of the content managementaccounts and a second data point that identifies a second time viewedfor a second content item viewed in association with the first contentmanagement account, and wherein the first time viewed corresponds to anearlier date than the second time viewed, and wherein the weightingfactors associated with the first and second data points render thefirst data point less significant than the second data point.
 3. Themethod recited in claim 1, wherein applying a respective weightingfactor comprises: applying an initial weighting factor based on therespective time viewed for the respective media content item presentedin association with the respective content management account, andapplying a mathematical transformation to the initial weighting factor.4. The method recited in claim 1, wherein the mathematicaltransformation imposes a maximum or minimum value on the initialweighting factor.
 5. The method recited in claim 1, wherein numericallymodeling the weighted input data comprises assigning, for each weightingfactor, a respective numerical significance to the respective data pointthat correlates with the weighting factor.
 6. The method recited inclaim 1, wherein each or selected ones of the times viewed comprises atime selected from the group consisting of: a time of day, a date, and atime period.
 7. The method recited in claim 1, wherein each the mediacontent recommendations comprises an estimate of a preference for therespective media content item and the respective content managementaccount.
 8. The method recited in claim 1, wherein the media contentitem is an item selected from the group consisting of: a video object, amedia content genre, a media content category, and a media contentchannel.
 9. A system comprising: a storage system operable to storeinput data for performing media content recommendation analysis, theinput data describing the presentation of a plurality of media contentitems in association with a plurality of content management accounts,the input data comprising a plurality of data points, each of the datapoints identifying a respective time viewed for a respective one of themedia content items presented in association with a respective one ofthe content management accounts, the time viewed identifying a date ortime of day that the media content item has been presented inassociation with the content management account; and a processoroperable to: apply, for each or selected ones of the data points, arespective weighting factor based on the respective time viewed for therespective media content item presented in association with therespective content management account, and numerically model theweighted input data to produce a plurality of media contentrecommendations, each of the media content recommendations identifying arespective one of the media content items and a respective one of thecontent management accounts.
 10. The system recited in claim 9, whereinthe plurality of data points includes a first data point that identifiesa first time viewed for a first content item viewed in association witha first one of the content management accounts and a second data pointthat identifies a second time viewed for a second content item viewed inassociation with the first content management account, and wherein thefirst time viewed corresponds to an earlier date than the second timeviewed, and wherein the weighting factors associated with the first andsecond data points render the first data point less significant than thesecond data point.
 11. The system recited in claim 9, wherein applying arespective weighting factor comprises: applying an initial weightingfactor based on the respective time viewed for the respective mediacontent item presented in association with the respective contentmanagement account, and applying a mathematical transformation to theinitial weighting factor.
 12. The system recited in claim 11, whereinthe mathematical transformation imposes a maximum or minimum value onthe initial weighting factor.
 13. The system recited in claim 9, whereinnumerically modeling the weighted input data comprises assigning, foreach weighting factor, a respective numerical significance to therespective data point that correlates with the weighting factor.
 14. Thesystem recited in claim 9, wherein each or selected ones of the timesviewed comprises a time selected from the group consisting of: a time ofday, a date, and a time period.
 15. The system recited in claim 9,wherein each the media content recommendations comprises an estimate ofa preference for the respective media content item and the respectivecontent management account.
 16. The system recited in claim 9, whereinthe media content item is an item selected from the group consisting of:a video object, a media content genre, a media content category, and amedia content channel.
 17. One or more computer readable media havinginstructions stored thereon for performing a method, the methodcomprising: identifying input data for performing media contentrecommendation analysis, the input data describing the presentation of aplurality of media content items in association with a plurality ofcontent management accounts, the input data comprising a plurality ofdata points, each of the data points identifying a respective timeviewed for a respective one of the media content items presented inassociation with a respective one of the content management accounts,the time viewed identifying a date or time of day that the media contentitem has been presented in association with the content managementaccount; for each or selected ones of the data points, applying arespective weighting factor based on the respective time viewed for therespective media content item presented in association with therespective content management account; and storing on a storage system aplurality of media content recommendations produced by numericallymodeling the weighted input data, each of the media contentrecommendations identifying a respective one of the media content itemsand a respective one of the content management accounts.
 18. The one ormore computer readable media recited in claim 17, wherein the pluralityof data points includes a first data point that identifies a first timeviewed for a first content item viewed in association with a first oneof the content management accounts and a second data point thatidentifies a second time viewed for a second content item viewed inassociation with the first content management account, and wherein thefirst time viewed corresponds to an earlier date than the second timeviewed, and wherein the weighting factors associated with the first andsecond data points render the first data point less significant than thesecond data point.
 19. The one or more computer readable media recitedin claim 17, wherein applying a respective weighting factor comprises:applying an initial weighting factor based on the respective time viewedfor the respective media content item presented in association with therespective content management account, and applying a mathematicaltransformation to the initial weighting factor.
 20. The one or morecomputer readable media recited in claim 17, wherein numericallymodeling the weighted input data comprises assigning, for each weightingfactor, a respective numerical significance to the respective data pointthat correlates with the weighting factor.